Don't Touch Me... Don't Even Look At Me.

Owl Monkey shows you what "The Witching Hour" 7-8 pm looks like.

Being an monkey mama isn't all it's cracked up to be sometimes.

My kids still cry. I still have to discipline and direct my 3 year old. Yesterday was especially difficult. Squirrel Monkey, 3 years (SM) is getting sick and Owl Monkey, 5.5 months (OM) is still sick. When SM is feeling sick, she is very testy. So, yesterday, she kept doing things she knew she shouldn't to get my attention, acting out her physical feelings. She didn't want to eat anything I gave her, she was whiny, and she mostly wanted to watch TV all day. So by the time my husband, Gorillaman, got home, I. Was. DONE. But I can't be done. I have a nursling. And though that is often very zen... it wasn't yesterday.

We put the girls to bed at 8:00. That never happens here. SM is usually up until 9:00 or 9:30. She went to bed easily. But OM, who ususally goes to sleep pretty easily, was fussy because she couldn't breathe.

So the mother abuse began.

FACTS:

- Baby toes are like a velociraptor's. I have bruises on the insides of my legs from OM taking her big toes and digging them into anything she comes in contact with. Most of the time, especially when we are nursing lying down, that is my leg, groin, or stomach, as she writhes around being frustrated about her inability to breathe easily.

- It's especially uncomfortable, verging on vomit-inducingly painful, when the baby goes from nursing peacefully to clamp-and-twist in 0.2 seconds. It's even worse when you have a recurrent plugged duct because of said baby's latch. I know from experience... a lot of it.

- Babies have unbelievably strong fingers... the better to pinch you with. I have bruises on the insides of my arms and the tops of my breasts from aggrivated little fingers that find purchase and CLAMP DOWN! Hand wrangling should be a class for pregnant moms.

- Toddlers/preschoolers have sharper elbows than the coffee table corners we protected them from a couple of years before.

My normally sweet and gentle OM has become a baby badger. Ow. Add that to the bone crushing antics of a testing toddler, well, is it any surprise why I avoid any sense of intimacy on a day like yesterday? By the end of the day, when I have been poked, prodded, pinched, and pummeled by tiny hands, feet, and toothless gums, I don't want to be touched. By anyone. I don't even want to hold hands. My lucky poor husband, who has been away from his doting family all day, wants to come home and have some sort of physical closeness, even if it's just to sit together on the couch and watch our show. It's not fair that our jobs give us seriously different needs. But such is life so we both make sacrifices. So sometimes I snuggle, though it makes me feel like crawling out of my skin. And sometimes he takes a cold shower. ;) Such is this life of parental bliss. And bliss it is. For just as you think you can't handle any more, your 3 year old crawls into your arms again and needs you to snuggle her to sleep. Your 5.5 month old flashes that gummy, milky grin. And suddenly your heart is full again, the bruises don't matter, and you hug your husband that much closer knowing that only the two of you truly understand.

It's all worth it.

A Few Thoughts on Miscarriage

A question on one of my favorite Facebook pages, JessicaThe Leaky Boob the other day, has had me thinking. She asked, "What do you wish people talked about?" Be it taboo or just never talked about, what would it help if people discussed it?

My immediate thought was miscarriage. Though there are hundreds, maybe thousands, of pregnancy and infant loss (PAIL) support groups out there, baby loss still seems to be a taboo topic among women. That has been my observation, anyway.

I experienced my first miscarriage in February, 2011. It was heartbreaking. We had been trying to get pregnant since my cycles returned when Squirrel Monkey turned 1. Each month my cycle came and left, and we dreaded them. Until January, we found out we were pregnant again. Though it was super early, I wanted so badly to tell people, especially those who had been on this rollercoaster with us. We even surprised my MIL with a piece of quinoa (the size of the baby) in a ring box to tell her we were finally pregnant. The next day I started bleeding. I searched the internet trying to find hope that this was normal, but it wasn't. It kept getting stronger and more painful until I was passing large clots. I finally knew I was losing my baby.

Everything I found online said "chemical pregnancy." That's the medical term for a miscarriage that happens right around when you'd normally expect your period, but you've had a positive pregnancy test. The fertilized egg has been pumping out hormones that tell your body, "Get ready, we're pregnant!" but something is wrong with either the egg or the uterus and your body does what it was meant to do and scraps the whole process. That term sterilized my feelings. I began to refer to "it" as a chemical pregnancy, instead of a baby like I had only days before, telling people that I was grieving the loss of the "baby who could have been." I refused to let myself believe that there had been a baby inside me. In doing so, I never grieved losing that baby - and I needed to.

I got pregnant with Owl Monkey a few months later. Through the miracle of hormones, you are actually more fertile in the months following a chemical pregnancy. Though I went on to have a pretty easy pregnancy, I was worried every day that something would happen and I would lose her. I feared that I wouldn't ever bond with her since I was afraid to love her while I was pregnant. When she started kicking I worried less, but that nagging feeling was always there.


Here I am now with a 5.5 month old rainbow, angel of a baby! I thank my Heavenly Father everyday for my children. If you've gone through that loss, there is hope. One day you will turn around and see that it aches a little less. I pray that everyone can have a happy ending like mine. A healthy baby to replace some of those hurt feelings. She has healed a lot of me.


I know that some people will read this and cringe because I have openly shared something that is not easily talked about. I wish that would change. I think that women need to know and hear about the whole range of normal emotions that other women have felt when dealing with the loss of a baby. It is empowering to talk about our birth experiences and I think that it is also encouraging and healing to talk about our feelings of loss.

Hopefully women can begin to feel safe sharing their experiences and working through their feelings.

Like I said earlier, there are lots of resources, especially online, for women dealing with miscarriage, baby loss, or pregnancy after loss (PAL). Here are a few links:

LDS Pregnancy and Infant Loss Support Group

(Website) Little Ones Lost

(Blog) Little Ones Lost: Stories of LDS Miscarriage, Stillbirth, & Ectopic Pregnancy

I recently read a blog post on Mormon Women titled, Ask a Mormon Woman: "What are Mormon views on pregnancy, childbirth, and medical intervention?". If you don't know what LDS families believe about these topics, I think it offers some excellent insight.

I have found comfort reading the words of other women who have survived the loss of their sweet babies. This old Ensign article is one of those.  And during and after my miscarriage, and subsequent issues associated with my PAL journey, I recieved a lot of comfort from the words of a friend of mine on her blog, Talk Birth. This story is especially heart breaking... she recounts the day she lost her little boy, Noah, at 14 weeks. But while I was losing my baby, it helped me to read her story and know that I too would survive. She has gone on to have an amazing little girl. And that, too, was inspiring for me, as I was worrying through my subsequent pregnancy.


We will heal. Families are forever. I don't know what God has in store for those special babies. But I do know that He can comfort us when we are struggling to make sense of our loss. <3

A Little Science For Your Brain

Here are some things I read this week that I find interesting:

1.) Trying to have a baby via IVF? Don't drink coffee. A new study shows that if you do, your chances of conceiving go down drastically. There may be a link between caffeine and fertility.

2.) Scientists are beginning to understand why smoking harms reproductive health. Well, you probably already knew that. But we're starting to discover exactly HOW, and that's pretty cool.

3.) It seems that even in small and rural cities, boys who are exposed to violence have lower reactivity to cortisol (A.K.A. The Stress Hormone). Girls' cortisol levels seemed to be unaffected. This study suggests that just by talking to our kids about violent episodes (perhaps what they see at school or on TV?) can help them to be able to reduce cortisol levels, thus helping them cope with stress.

4.) It looks like there's a link between childhood maltreatment and later suicide. Nuff said.

5.) And here's one that the nutritionist in me loved! Not all "Gluten Free" labeled foods are healthy. A mere 1% of the population has realio-trulio gluten intolerance, but everyone is jumping on the GF bandwagon. Here's a tip; if it's labeled Gluten Free, Fat Free, Sugar Free, or any other Free, odds are it's full of fake crap that will eventually kill you. Just kidding. You probably won't really DIE from it. But it probably won't help. Eat real food as close to the original source as possible.

Enjoy your weekend!

How I Became a Monkey Mama

May 2009

When I found out I was pregnant with my first baby, I knew I wanted to be a great mom. I didn't know what that meant, but I wanted to be it.

"The moment a child is born, the mother is also born. She never existed before. The woman existed, but the mother, never. A mother is something absolutely new." ~Rajneesh

 I knew I wanted an intervention-free birth. But everyone gets an epidural, right?! Even though I had already labored well at home to 6 cm, I asked for an epidural upon admission to the hospital and the interventions rolled (and rolled, and rolled) after. My experience horrified me. Ever since, I've advocated for medication-free birth whenever possible.

 I knew I wanted to nurse my baby. Squirrel Monkey was a champion nurser with a bad latch, but boy, was she eager! I knew then that breastfeeding was perfect for us. I had no idea I'd do it for the next 2 years. We had many, many hiccups, including almost completely weaning at 14 months due to a torn ligament in my back. But even though every other day I would tell myself I'd be stopping tomorrow, I kept going - for her.

I tried to do the "normal" thing and set up the nursery with the cutest crib and crib bedding. Little did I know, my sweet new daughter would teach me a way better and more natural way of mothering. After a few nights of going to her every time I heard a rustle, sleeping TERRIBLY,  spending hours in the office chair we kept next to her bed, waking bleary-eyed and loathing night time, I took her to bed with me and never looked back. At first, I would place her on a pillow next to me (propped up since she had some apnea issues) with my husband in the other room. I was terrified of hurting her in my sleep. Now I know that it's way safer to sleep with/near your baby. Eventually we turned our crib into a co-sleeper side-car like this. It's wonderful. I recommend it to everyone who fed into the you-need-a-crib crowd. It's way nicer to get some use out of it other than a laundry basket or catch all. Now 3 years later, she still sleeps in it, safe next to us.

I never felt right about letting her cry, so the cry-it-out argument seemed silly to me immediately. At some point we started using cloth diapers (part-time). Then we started eating healthier; more local, more whole, less I-can't-pronounce-those ingredients. Soon I was baby-wearing and avoiding the doctor as much as possible. Then, one day, I looked up. I realized that I wasn't like most of the moms I knew. I fit more with the "crunchy" crowd. And I knew my baby had changed me. We were so in sync that it all made sense. I wanted what she wanted, and what she wanted was natural. I had turned into Monkey Mama!

January 2012

Then in January, we were blessed with the arrival of our second daughter. I'm still learning! Owl Monkey is a much calmer baby. I attribute some of that to practicing from day 1 what I learned with Squirrel Monkey. Even though her birth was induced, I didn't have pain meds and demanded delayed cord-clamping. Nursing is great, minus a couple of plugged ducts along the way. We have slept in the same bed since the hospital. She never spent more than a few moments for a diaper change in that plastic box. I can count the number of times she's cried real tears on my fingers. She's happiest in the Moby Wrap or Mei Tai (ours is a hand-me-down, handmade one). Now, with Owl Monkey, I'm doing a delayed vaccination schedule since the amount of shots they give at one time scares me.

The more I learn, the more I change. Parenting requires bending. You must learn from the past, change for the future, but live in the now. I consider myself a Monkey Mama because I feel a strong kinship with the way that monkeys and apes mother their babies. They are never separated, don't feed artificial food, and mother instinctively. That's my goal.

How does all of this fit in with my faith in God and my morals, values, and standards? Well, that's what this blog is all about. As I struggle to make it all fit, I'll share it here in the hopes of inspiring other LDS (Mormon) moms, and moms of all faiths to do the same. Breastfeeding and modesty. Co-sleeping and sex. How a liberal Mormon copes in a very conservative community. I'll go there, and hopefully you'll go with me.